Texas is No. 48 in charity gifts? Depends who’s counting, and how

Chuck Scherer and Rob Hood with the $11.6 million charity check for local nonprofits from the annual Dean & DeLuca Invitational golf tournament at Colonial Country Club.
Fabiana Van LenteColonial Country Club

That’s consistent with other rankings in recent years showing Johnson County as one of the most generous, similar to Wal-Mart headquarters Bentonville, Ark., or Charlottesville, Va.

But here’s the catch: Those figures give more weight to church donations and tithes. Southern cities with big churches, and religious centers such as Salt Lake City, rank high.

Both the WalletHub.com and Chronicle studies ranked Utah and Salt Lake City at the very top. But after that, the Chronicle numbers favored Southern metropolitan areas such as Memphis, Nashville and Atlanta, while WalletHub.com’s formula favored Minnesota, Oklahoma and smaller states such as Delaware or New Hampshire.

This might explain the difference: WalletHub.com gave equal weight to the “number of charities per capita” and “number of food banks per capita,” rankings where Texas’ size and sprawl doesn’t fit the formula. (For example, Texas was bottom-five in “fewest charities.”)

(Also, the WalletHub.com study did not include donations to charitable foundations, explaining that there is no way to ensure they are used for the public good. That discounted gifts from many Texas families.)

The WalletHub.com study was compiled by Richie Bernardo, a reporter and data analyst.

Among his other work for the website, which publishes studies to attract readers and sell them financial services: “States With The Biggest Bullying Problems,” “Worst Cties for Drivers,” “Most Gambling-Addicted States” and “Fattest States.”

Texas’ great ranching, oil and business families have set the standard by giving generously, and most Texans chip in.

About Bud Kennedy

Bud Kennedy is a homegrown Fort Worth guy who started out covering high school football here when he was 16. He went away to the Fort Worth Press and newspapers in Austin and Dallas, then came home in 1981.

Since 1987, he's written more than 1,000 weekly dining columns and more than 3,000 news and politics columns. If you don't like what he says about politics, read him on barbecue.